also, what happens to all current commendations? do they turn into points or just rendered worthless?

Current Commendations will be going away, we will have more details in the coming weeks on their conversion.

Quote:

Originally Posted by De-mu-noki

First of, are these random drops, that is to say that if I'm extremely unlucky I can't get the best earpiece for my char at all? Secondly, are you saying that if a player grinds H2's for long enough he can get Nightmare gear?

Yup, the drops will be random. The item type is determined by your Advanced Class and the item rating is determined by your Command Rank (higher rank = higher item rating). Keep in mind that you can always earn more Crates and that you can disintegrate any duplicate or unwanted items into CXP to get your next Crate faster.

Yes. All end-game gear (level 70+) can be earned by doing almost any activity. However, someone doing Nightmare (Master) level Operations, as an example, will get there substantially faster than someone doing easy/solo content.